Friday, September 19, 2003

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Wired News
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1.  Nearing a Tax-Free Internet. Two months before a temporary ban expires, the House of Representatives passes a bill to permanently nix taxes on Internet access and traffic. Now it's up to the Senate.
2.  How Soviet Viruses May Save Us. Wanton use of antibiotics has led to new generations of superbugs, and doctors are losing the war against runaway drug-resistant bacteria. The new secret weapon: phages. By Richard Martin of Wired magazine.
3.  E-Voting Audit Ready for Public. An audit of software for the Diebold touch-screen voting machines is now complete. The report, which will be made public soon, calls for changes to address security concerns. By Kim Zetter.
4.  A Festival for the Rest of Us. Sci-fi and fantasy films, and their horrible little brother, the slasher film, have never been accorded lofty status in American pop culture. Now along comes Mania Fest, which hopes to rectify the situation. By Jason Silverman.
5.  Laying Data Traps for Isabel. Scientists are putting themselves and their instruments directly in the path of Hurricane Isabel. The goal is to capture information that will improve weather prediction. By Michelle Delio.
6.  JetBlue Shared Passenger Data. The airline admits it gave 5 million itineraries to a defense contractor last year without passengers' consent. The contractor bought more personal information on the passengers, including Social Security numbers -- for what purpose? By Ryan Singel.

11:14:29 PM    

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Hack the Planet
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1.  EE Times: Engineer creates HDL generation language. Confluence looks conceptually similar to Bluespec.

10:14:07 PM    

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CNET News.com - Front Door
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1.  New ISO fees on the horizon?. IT groups seek to rally opposition to proposal that would add usage royalties to widely used standards, including country codes.
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Slashdot
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2.  Tzero Electric Car: 0-60 in 3.7 Seconds
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Hack the Planet
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3.  InfoWorld: Sun touts Fast Web Services plan.

9:13:50 PM    

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CNET News.com - Front Door
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1.  Microsoft corporate-development VP exits. Former investment banker Richard Emerson, who oversaw the software giant's merger and acquisition strategy, has left the company, Microsoft confirms.
2.  Motorola chief to step down. Chris Galvin, CEO of the handset maker, plans to leave his post after a difference in opinion with other executives over the company's future direction.
3.  Eolas says it would settle over IE. The company's founder says Microsoft is free to use patented technology in its Internet Explorer browser, provided it buys a license. Eolas had been seen by some as unwilling to cooperate.
4.  Drive standard to pump data on the double. A group working to improve the Serial ATA communication standard for hard drives promises a spec to up its data-transfer rate to 3Gbps by the end of the year.
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Slashdot
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5.  P2P Filesharing vs. The Web
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Wired News
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6.  From Cracker to Tracker. If crackers operated like the mob, David Smith would be a marked man. Smith, convicted of transmitting the Melissa virus in 1999, has been spending his prison time helping the feds hunt down other virus spreaders.
7.  (Hard Drive) Size Does Matter. A group of computer owners sues eight of the largest personal-computer makers for overstating the capacity of their hard drives. The missing storage space, the plaintiffs say, could store an extra 2,000 songs or 20,000 pictures.
8.  In Britain, Spammers Will Pay. Instead of the latest U.S. tactic in the spam war -- paying spammers not to spam-- Britain looks at the flip side the coin. A new law makes spamming a criminal act worthy of jury trials and the potential for unlimited fines.
9.  Why Stock Options Still Rule. As stock options evaporate, tech workers may realize they're left with a dead-end career and no chance to strike it rich. Look out, Microsoft, the next wave of startups is on its way. By Michael S. Malone of Wired magazine.
10.  Vegas Gung-Ho on Gambling Tech. Cashless casinos, RFID-enabled player cards and downloadable games are just a few of the innovations in the pipeline for dedicated gamblers, say participants at a gaming industry expo. Daniel Terdiman reports from Las Vegas.
11.  Windows to Power ATMs in 2005. Most U.S. banks plan to convert their ATMs to the Windows operating system by 2005. Will this move make bank customers vulnerable to malicious Internet attacks and the infamous blue screen of death? By Elisa Batista.
12.  Bidding Your Job Bon Voyage. Shipping jobs overseas saves companies money by letting them hire cheap labor, but it costs jobs at home. Outsourcing has its defenders and detractors, and a lot of them are at a Manhattan trade show. Michelle Delio reports from New York.
13.  Public Wants Biotech Food Tested. Consumers believe the FDA should verify that genetically modified foods are safe before they're offered for sale, a new study finds. The FDA says a biotech company's word is good enough. By Kristen Philipkoski.
14.  JetBlue 'Fesses Up, Quietly. Apologizing through e-mail is JetBlue's attempt to placate customers enraged at learning that the airline gave 5 million passenger records to a government contractor without informing anyone. By Ryan Singel.

8:13:27 PM    

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CNET News.com - Front Door
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1.  Security experts find open-source flaws. Although Microsoft Windows vulnerabilities get most of the headlines, researchers this week identified vulnerabilities in two commonly used open-source software products.
2.  Eolas suit may spark HTML changes. As anxiety builds throughout the Web over the patent threatening Microsoft's browser, the Web's leading standards group is considering modifying HTML to address the same threat.
3.  Magnets attracting wireless attention. The humble star of many a science project is gaining the attention of home-electronics firms and government agencies as an alternative to Bluetooth and other wireless techniques.
4.  Blade pact is double-edged. An Intel-IBM partnership to build blade servers yields its first results--but the companies are running into resistance to their plan to make their models a widely used standard.
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Slashdot
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5.  Telstar 4 is Down
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Hack the Planet
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6.  Hey Dave, what's up with copying Isabel images to your site? What's wrong with links?
7.  I came in near the end of Vernor Vinge's talk, so I didn't catch what he said about new economic models except the idea that brilliant children could have personalized education paid for by taking a cut of all their future earnings. (Zipf at work, I guess.) He mentioned something about Bruce Sterling pinging his left cowboy boot to locate it. He's met people who wanted to be focused. Ubiquitous law enforcement as the dark side of trusted computing. Something about the net of a million lies. He references his own books frequently, which I guess is excusable.
8.  I found out about Bluespec tody; it looks much better than VHDL. And it's based on Haskell! In retrospect, it makes sense that a pure functional language would provide a better basis for naturally concurrent hardware than a sequential language.
9.  David "stupid network" Isenberg has a weblog.
10.  Divmod Quotient brings together your email, IM/IRC and IP telephony. Having not tried it yet, it looks a little like Zoe.
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InfoWorld: Top News
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11.  DemoMobile: Pulling mobile workers into the enterprise flow. SAN DIEGO -- Early wireless applications focused on pushing corporate data out to the mobile workforce, but did little to integrate those applications and workers into existing enterprise processes.
12.  PeopleSoft customers believe Oracle deal is dead. ANAHEIM, CALIFORNIA - As Oracle and PeopleSoft continue wrangling in regulatory and legal venues over Oracle's attempted hostile takeover of PeopleSoft, some customers attending this week's PeopleSoft Connect said they're inclined to believe Chief Executive Officer Craig Conway's assurances that the proposed deal is dead.
13.  Intel showcases chip visions. SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA - Talk of the blurring line between mobile communications and computing was central to this week's Fall Intel Developer Forum. While Intel's vision of a converged future dominated proceedings, the major announcements at the show were about desktop and server processors.
14.  BTO buzz rises at TechXNY. NEW YORK - Technology executives can add a new acronym to their list of IT buzzwords: BTO, for business transformation outsourcing. The concept has been touted by a variety of service providers for the past year or so, but judging from panel discussions at OutsourceWorld in New York, which ended Thursday, BTO is gaining currency as a term of art and as an innovative way of thinking about how to take advantage of outsource providers.
15.  VeriSign changes prompt privacy warnings, anger. BOSTON - Privacy advocates are warning that recent changes to the .com and .net database of domain names by VeriSign could violate the privacy of millions of Internet users, inadvertently sending confidential e-mail content and Web surfing data to VeriSign's systems.
16.  Code editors renew approach to IDEs. Call it a back-to-basics movement or simply professionals seeking the best tools to get the job done well and on time. With enterprises putting a premium on productivity, a quiet revolution among programmers is eschewing the heavy, feature-filled IDE and turning instead to the venerable standby: the code editor.
17.  DemoMobile illuminates unwired future. At DemoMobile 2003 last week in San Diego, vendors showcased technology aimed at easing wireless device management and deployment -- a potential windfall for the enterprise given the multitude of wireless devices and gadgets also unveiled at the show.
18.  Intel focuses on blades. Looking to help its manufacturers compete in the blade server market, Intel is introducing a new family of products. Last week at the Intel Developer Forum, Intel announced a new blade server product family that it will sell to tier-two server manufacturers.
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InfoWorld: Security
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19.  VeriSign changes prompt privacy warnings, anger. Privacy advocates claim Site Finder captures user data
20.  Fixed wireless future takes shape. Fixed wireless providers can give relief to your company, and you don't have to give up security to get it
21.  Expect the unexpected when it comes to security. Vigilance is the key to keeping your enterprise out of the security waste land
22.  CyberGatekeeper polices policies. InfoExpress' hardware/software combo prevents noncompliant clients from accessing the network
23.  Mitigating risk with vulnerability scans. Software packages from Latis, Rapid7 seek out network security shortcomings

7:13:07 PM    

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New York Times: Technology
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1.  Music File Sharers Keep Sharing. Despite high-profile lawsuits against people accused of distributing music over the Internet, millions continue to share songs. By Amy Harmon with John Schwartz.
2.  AOL to Be Dropped by Time Warner. AOL Time Warner plans to change its name to Time Warner and its stock symbol to "TWX" over the next several weeks. By Andrew Ross Sorkin and David D. Kirkpatrick.
3.  Life Is Just a Video Game (With Very High Stakes). Olivier Assayas's diabolical techno thriller begins as a post-Hitchcockian corporate melodrama and slowly turns into a cinematic video game. By Stephen Holden.
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CNET News.com - Front Door
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4.  FindWhat renegotiates eSpotting merger. The search company says it's talking through its merger with Espotting after discovering that the U.K. company's finances were overstated. FindWhat shares drop more than 19 percent.
5.  Accessing MSN via cell phone? It'll cost you. Microsoft is set to start charging a subscription fee for MSN Mobile, a service that lets customers check their MSN e-mail and other services through Web-enabled cell phones.
6.  Do Not E-mail plan won't work
7.  Commentary: Waiting for secure Web services. Web Services Distributed Management must wait for secure Web services standards before it will become an important part of future environments.
8.  RIAA sues iMesh file-trading firm. The Recording Industry Association of America says it had sued the Israeli file-swapping company, one of the oldest of the peer-to-peer companies still in operation.
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Slashdot
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9.  It's a Laptop - It's a Desktop
10.  P2P Music Sharing Remains Popular Despite RIAA
11.  Windows ATMs by 2005
12.  Privacy International Internet Censorship Report
13.  Principal Photography on Star Wars III Complete
14.  China Joins EU in Galileo Satellite Venture
15.  Microsoft Works on Search Capabilities
16.  Review: Sun StarOffice 7
17.  More on BTX Motherboards
18.  S3's DeltaChrome Graphics Chip
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BBC News | Technology | UK Edition
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19.  $2.26bn Dutch telecom sell-off. The Dutch government sells off shares in telecoms group KPN for $2.26bn to US bank Citigroup.
20.  AOL Time Warner drops 'AOL'. Media giant AOL Time Warner abandons the AOL prefix to its name, in a symbolic reversal of the mega-merger which created the firm.
21.  New internet worm warning. Security experts fear another computer worm outbreak will hit the internet soon.
22.  Mobile boss bans e-mails. A British entrepreneur bans the sending of internal e-mails in his business, saying it wastes up to three hours a day.
23.  China joins EU's satellite network. China is to invest in the Galileo GPS satellite tracking system being developed by the EU.
24.  Millions 'confused' by digital TV. Millions of people are not using digital TV because they find the technology too confusing, a study says.
25.  Xbox woos younger gamers. Microsoft tries to change the Xbox image as a console for hardcore gamers by promoting family-friendly games.
26.  Site finding system under fire. Changes to what the net does with mistyped domain names has provoked protests and legal action.
27.  Net 'worth little to many Brits'. More Britons have access to the net than ever, but people need convincing it is worth going online, says a study.
28.  Virus poses as Microsoft update. A Windows virus masquerading as a security update from Microsoft is spreading via e-mail, warn experts.
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InfoWorld: Top News
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29.  HP's Fiorina to leave Cisco's board. Hewlett-Packard Co. Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Carly Fiorina has opted not to stand for reelection to Cisco Systems Inc.'s board of directors, the networking equipment maker said Thursday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). No reason was given for Fiorina's decision not to seek reelection to the board.
30.  Tibco upgrades products, sees 'predictive' enterprise. Tibco Software Inc. announced upgrades to some of its core messaging and integration products Friday, along with a longer term plan to develop software that it said will help enterprises react more quickly to unplanned events affecting their businesses.
31.  Forbes: Bill Gates still world's richest man. Forbes magazine released its list of the 400 wealthiest U.S. citizens Thursday, revealing that once again Microsoft Corp. Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates has not only grabbed the top spot but is the world's richest man with a net worth of $46 billion.
32.  Verisign sued over Site Finder. An Internet search company has sued VeriSign Inc. over a widely criticized service that sends Web users to a VeriSign search page after entering a non-existent Web address.
33.  Dell comments help delay modular computing initiative. SAN FRANCISCO -- Comments made by Michael Dell at last week's OracleWorld conference here have helped derail plans to launch an industrywide initiative aimed at standardizing server components, according to industry sources.
34.  Skype adds new languages to Internet phone software. Skype, the new Internet telephone service launched last month by the creators of file-swapping service Kazaa, is now available in several European languages.
35.  Bull launches NovaScale blade servers. Bull SA launched a series of blade servers Friday, as part of its NovaScale server range.
36.  Hot market poses Russia outsourcer staffing need. Faced with an increasingly competitive Moscow labor market, Russia's leading offshore outsourcing firm is drawing talent from outlying cities and even former Soviet republics in a bid to keep costs down and fight staff attrition.
37.  Proposed rules add IT requirement to shipments. New import regulations being finalized this year may force companies importing products into the United States by land or air to computerize their shipping manifests if they have not already done so.
38.  Dell to unveil new Axims, MP3 player Thursday. Dell Inc. plans to announce an MP3 player based on a hard drive, and unveil two new Axim PDAs (personal digital assistants) next Thursday, according to a source familiar with the company's plans.
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InfoWorld: Security
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39.  The death spiral. Will IT ride today's approach to anti-worm and anti-virus software to certain doom?
40.  New Internet worm targets e-mail, p-to-p software. Vulnerability found in Microsoft's IE Web browser
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The Register
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41.  Cisco under threat in VoIP stronghold. Competition grows
42.  Nasty worm poses as MS security update. Updated Swen: old trick, new packaging
43.  Verisign's SiteFinder finds privacy hullabaloo. Making Overtures
44.  PDA implicated in Gilligan WMD dossier probe. Notes bona fide, or fiddled?
45.  DSL growth outstrips demand for cable. Boom
46.  Software guru wants New Accounting. I'm a VB programmer, and I need TLC
47.  Fiorina quits Cisco board. Chambers draws $1 salary (with $85m share options)
48.  Telewest Business to axe 120 jobs. Major shake-up
49.  Verisign backlash gathers force. All your Web typos aren't belong to us
50.  eBay to Feds: come and get what you want. 'Our Privacy Policy has been enhanced to remove your Privacy'

6:12:48 PM    

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